The curiosity to know, to experience and to learn
In the book ‘Vedere la mente’ (‘Seeing the mind’) that he dedicated to his grandchildren, Guido Sgaravatti tried to make profound concepts simple.
The book, dated 2002, was illustrated by him learning the rudiments of Paint.
Mum said that the drawings would definitely come out better freehand…of course she was right, but never being satisfied with what he already knew and experimenting with new things was in his personality.
A funny anecdote about his approach to technology
I wondered why he changed computers so often. He claimed that, all of a sudden, they would stop working properly…I later realised why.
One day he asked me: “Can you come up? My computer is not working.”
Arriving at his desk, I saw that he had opened his mailbox and at the top were endless mails to close. “Excuse me Dad, but since when haven’t you closed the mails you read?”
“Why? Does it have to be done?”
“Sure…see above, you have an endless string of emails open on your computer…no wonder it crashes!”
“Do they really have to be closed? How do you do that?”
After an hour or so spent with him closing them, the computer was back to working fine.
It is certainly not easy for a person born in 1925 to master technology, but curiosity to learn new things has always been his strength, right up to the very end.
Guido Sgaravatti can undoubtedly be described as an eclectic artist, always curious about knowledge and experimentation.
Not up to date with technology, all right, but he has experimented a lot with the material.
In sculpture he ranged from ceramics to bronze, from plaster to marble.
In freehand drawings, from Indian ink to ballpoint or fountain pen.
From canvases to faesite or masonite for oil painting.
From monotypes, a technique he invented, to multiples with engraved plates in etchings.
Not to mention wood, the metal he loved to weld with his friend Giannino and many other materials he tried to model.
With pen or pencil in hand he produced so much; he always needed to visualise what was in front of him, he even sketched his drawings on the kitchen table and more than once my heart cried when cleaning it:
“Dad do you need paper? Here it is, take it, but don’t draw on the table, we have to clean it afterwards.”
But it was a waste of time: he felt the need to draw everywhere, to visualise his thoughts.
He needed to see matter transform and take shape.
He needed to see the mind to open it also to us children and grandchildren, without prejudice.
A small extract from the book ‘Vedere la Mente’ by Guido Sgaravatti
The interruption of discourse
It will have happened to all of us to observe that, during television debates on the most varied topics, highly qualified personalities in the fields of politics, culture, journalism, do not know how to conduct a polite conversation and use to interrupt each other, creating a break in the associative chain in the interlocutor’s thinking.
In this case, the word is used as a vehicle for an aggressive emotional charge. It is these charges, used by almost all individuals, that generate that collective psychic field that is unconsciously perceived as a sense of tension and can generate considerable disturbances in the most sensitive individuals. Evidence of this becomes palpable in the globalisation group, with the rapid feel-good effect on the participant when any kind of leadership is eliminated or strongly reduced.
Guido Sgaravatti, ‘Vedere la mente’, 2002
Thank you for your teachings.
Antonio Sgaravatti
Sgaravatti Trend Staff
Antonio Sgaravatti
